An international partnership consisting of top Universities and the collaboration of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) across India, Africa and the USA has formed the ‘One Agriculture-One Science: A Global Education Consortium' initiative.

‘One Agriculture-One Science' is a consortium of agricultural education institutes, research organizations and other related agencies specifically focused on addressing changes and adaptations required for agricultural education to be better and make an impact on development goals. Particularly the attainment of food and nutritional security, and sustainable agricultural production in developing countries.

The workshop jointly organized by ICRISAT, the University of Florida (UF), Michigan State University and Iowa State University, held at UF, Gainesville, Florida, USA on 17-18 July 2014 was attended by select experts from land grant state universities in the USA, the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), the African Green Revolution Alliance (AGRA), the Regional University Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM, a consortium of 42 universities in 19 countries in Africa), US Department of Agriculture, US Agency for International Development, and CGIAR centers.

‘One Agriculture-One Science' is a common platform to comprehensively address gaps in agricultural education with latest advancements in technology and knowledge flow strategies," said Dr William D Dar, director general, ICRISAT, at the launch of the initiative. "The task of revitalizing global agricultural education requires all of us to work together in developing an educational and capacity building road map focused on how we can better contribute to global food and nutritional security through a global education consortium for development," he continued.

"As a land grant university engaged in worldwide research, we at UF's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) know that relationships with our international partners are reciprocal, and that sometimes, we experience reverse technology transfer," said Dr Jack Payne, senior VP, UF, Gainesville.